Manhwa & Manhua Shout Out: 3/01/16 - 4/01/16

Welcome, one and all, to our monthly Manhwa & Manhua shout-out! Looking for a new series to read? Curious what the heck Manhwa and Manhua are? We've got you covered.

Manhwa and Manhua are a lot like Manga but they come from South Korea and China respectively; and carrying the added benefit of usually being in color. Sound interesting? Good, because today we present to you three more Manhwa & Manhua for your reading pleasure: Märchen: The Embodiment of Tales, Tales of Demons and Gods, and Special Martial Arts Extreme Hell Private High School. Learn about each series and see where you can start reading and discussing them below.

Deep in the mountains a young man named Marchen lives with his master, a legendary martial artist known as the Crimson Fairy as well as the woman who sacrificed her power to save him and in the process granted him a nearly indestructible body. However, when she tries to further train him she hits a roadblock. Marchen dislikes violence and constantly shirks his training in favor of cooking and reading. But he was born with a very special ability "The Embodiment of Tales". An ability that allows one to gain the martial arts techniques spoken of in legends simply by reading about them; and in the Hidden Library of Byeol Lim his real training is about to begin.

This series is part long form martial arts adventure and part collection of wonderfully written short stories, with a premise that blends the two together seamlessly.

The tales from which Marchen gains abilities are one of this series' biggest strengths. Using classic western fairy tales, such as Beauty and Beast and Snow White, as a base from which to create wuxia style martial arts stories is something that works incredibly well. So, if you've ever wondered what kung fu fairy tales would be like or are just in the mood for a good martial arts series, this is a must read.

Nie Li lived a long life of tragedy. He watched his home city destroyed, his loved ones perish. Left with nothing he traveled the world for years, learning many of it's secrets, only to be killed by the enemy he most wanted to defeat. After his death however, he's shocked to find himself back in school at the age of 13 once again in the city he saw destroyed and surrounded by the people he thought lost forever. So he resolves to change that future, to use all he knows to ensure that this time will be different.

This series is a bit like Naruto meets the movie Groundhog Day. It's got a distinctly shounen style with the added twist of the main character living his life a second time.

Making great use of colorful and expressive artwork this is a comic that brings a lot of life and humor to the popular Chinese webnovel it's based off of. Nie Yi's certainty that doom is creeping ever closer to his city lends the story a sense of urgency, while he uses every advantage he has from his lifetime's worth of knowledge to change people's fates and allow them to survive what's coming; all while his friends try to work out whether he's crazy brilliant or just plain crazy. The result is a fun shounen style series that's very much worth checking out.

Since Kang Chiu was young he's drooled excessively, often getting bullied and beaten up because of it. Seeking a new beginning and hoping to toughen up he agrees to a suggestion from his mother to transfer to a new school in a rural area called Geukji High. A high school that teaches sports and combat. Once he arrives however, he quickly realizes that if wanted safety he had definitely come to the wrong place. Also his homeroom teacher may or may not be Steven Segal, the principal might be his biological father, and one of his classmates is a... bear? So, yeah, he's in trouble.

This is an extreme martial arts parody where almost every attack is some form of double entendre and half the teachers are parodies of 80's action movie stars.

You can expect an endless stream of shockingly good art, off the wall comedy, and hilariously bizarre names from this one. It's the kind of series where a character not only shows up looking exactly like Bruce Lee but is actually named Brue-Balls Lee and whose every attack starts with the words "Brue-Balls". Including, my favorite, "Brue-Balls Festival". So if you're in the mood for a crazy comedy and martial arts genre spoof you'll have a blast with this one.